Natsukashii
by pengelyn
Summary: Sakura is a jaded young scenester waging a war with her own feelings of emptiness and stifled creativity in the unfulfilling 9 to 5 work world. Her crisis reaches fever pitch when exboyfriend Syaoran returns from Hong Kong.
1. Soundtrack for War

**Natsukashii  
**_This is the death of summer nights spent on rooftops - d.b.s._

**Disclaimer**: Not my characters - that's what makes it "FAN" fic.**  
**

**------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------**

**Chapter One**

_Soundtrack for War__  
_

_--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Lipgloss, neon, broken glass, eyelashes, smoke, sparkle, amaretto and coke, oh oh oh… the remains of the workday spilling furiously into their Tuesday night. She clinks the ice in her glass and thinks through a headache – what does it really matter, the flickering of fluorescent lights or the fluttering of powdered eyelids? Day becomes night in a never-ending feedback loop, people hunger for other people, and the world passes Sakura by. Nothing is how it used to be. She takes another sip on her short straw and slips off a shoe – rubbing her own sore feet, leaning on the second floor bar, with a lazy glance down at the milling and smiling below. Sakura, the cherry blossom girl, feels the changing of the seasons – even inside this closed, pressing club, even inside the store all day long – the cherry blossom knows that spring is fleeting.

A beautiful boy in eyeliner croons from the stage, a familiar song, as a kick drum beat reverberates through the soles of Sakura's aching feet. Tomoyo is below, with the others, watching the stage and shouting, laughing – the top of her glossy head gleams under the lights, watched from above. A sigh, a glance at the time – 10:57 – Sakura's head droops down onto her crossed arms. Too tired to dance. The boy on the stage howls into his microphone. One two. _Toniiight…._

Just then, she feels a touch on her shoulder and starts with surprise, shooting upright to meet a friendly gaze. A warm gaze. "Ha, sorry. I just wanted to see what was going on up here. You okay?" Eriol smiles gently, shrugs his shoulders. Neatly gelled hair and the sweet smell of aftershave. Sakura looks back over the railing, twirling a piece of hair between two fingers.

"Yeah, no worries. Just tired from work." Pause. Beautiful Tomoyo is holding hands with Chiharu down on the floor, swinging long, glossy hair from side to side.

Eriol's voice, yelling over the beat. "I was just gonna grab another drink. Do you want anything?"

"Um…" Sakura shakes the ice in the bottom of her glass, ponderously. Clink clink – this is one moment in time. "Do I want anything…" Eriol is a photograph of togetherness, the lights flash brightly around them… and a split-second shudder chills her like a spasm of guilt, like a cold tongue licking at her heart – shudder. She had almost forgotten herself… But now the day comes flooding back – ink blots on receipt backs, seven cups of coffee with stir sticks and sugar, clock hands moving slowly, the chiming, atonal bell of the phone ringing, ringing, ringing, and underneath it all… nothing. Nothing? Air conditioning, the smell of carpet, dust, computer screens and milling customers, yellow fluorescent flicker and nothing, stale, vitamin-deprived, etiolated nothing. The emptiness like a pang in her heart. Checking the clock and keeping score.

Back in the darkened, close air, a change plays across her face, Eriol catching it briefly. Sakura's eyes narrow and flash, almost feral. "You know what? Yes. Yes, for sure. Let me get yours too – what are you drinking?" Reaching into her purse with a determined motion – Eriol's liquid smile does not waver as he follows her to the bar, and down the stairs to the floor.

Four drinks. Five. Six. Sweet amaretto, then whiskey sour. Sakura is swinging her head and her hips to the overpowering bass, shoes in her hands and bare feet on the floor. She sings along to all the songs she knows and some she doesn't, Tomoyo and Sakura with voices raised to the flashing lights, arms around each other. This is freedom – Sakura swinging her head with eyes closed, an uncontrollable feeling welling inside her, the urge and compulsion to move. To shake off the emptiness of the clock, to shake and dance and run and run – pain melting away along with memory. Numb, forgetful feelings, melting like a balm so that even the ache of nostalgia for older days begins to subside. Sakura is somebody else, Sakura is nobody, running so fast that not even the change of seasons can catch her. In this dance, spring never ends, the petals never wither…

"Sakura…" It's Tomoyo's voice, lost in the music. Sakura is running away inside, as she holds her head with both hands and raises her face to the ceiling in ecstasy, opening her eyes to watch the changing coloured lights. "Sakura?" A gentle hand on her arm, but Sakura cannot feel it amidst the other bodies moving around her. There are beads of sweat like pearls on her bare skin. She is still dancing beautiful oblivion, until…

"Oh my God Sakura, did you see who's here!" Chiharu comes bounding through the crowd and shakes Sakura excitedly with both hands. Sakura blinks twice, as if waking from a dream. The faces of her friends come into focus softly, one pained with gentle care and worry, the other eager and hungry. "Sakura, you'll never guess who's back! He just walked in! You are gonna be so excited…"

"Sakura…" murmurs Tomoyo tentatively, reaching for her hands, but Sakura's eyes are already darting through the sea of heads. In spinning confusion, hope and fear collide – could it be? _He's here. Him. No. He's here He's here He's here._ Eyes and heart darting furious and reckless with fear tight in her throat, afraid to find what she searches for, trembling from the dancing, the drinking and now… Darting and catching on Eriol's face across the room, in conversation with a back-view of a familiar head and shoulders. Intake of breath. Shaggy dark hair above an expensive, impeccably pressed collar. Leather jacket. Foreign eloquence reading on a pair of stiff, shrugging shoulders. _He's here._

Part of Sakura's waking mind is turning to run but she walks toward the pair as if someone else controls her body, knocking against the arms of good-looking club-goers, gliding toward the magnetic pull of memory. Emotion builds behind her soaked eyes, her numb lips, moving closer. Bapesta sneakers, hand in the pocket of his designer denim, money speaking despite his shrugged shoulders and casual gait. How many years has it been? Three, four? She was sixteen…

Sakura stumbles and gasps, an empty glass in one hand. Eyes meet as he turns, and a dizzy blackness swallows them both.

Sakura crumples halfway to the sticky floor as Syaoran lurches forward instinctively to catch her. The creak of leather. He inhales, with his arms around her wilting form. Instantly they are surrounded – Eriol, Tomoyo, others cluster to help or to see what is causing the fuss. Face flushed from alcohol, head on a too-familiar shoulder, Sakura whispers "Syaoran…"

The first cherry blossom petal of spring falls softly to the ground.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A/N: And so begins my first-ever attempt at fan fic. Wah! This is rather un-Japanese AU based heavily on the city of Vancouver, especially the scenery and the music. Chapters are named after songs by local bands that inspired this fic, notably d.b.s, You Say Party? We Say Die, and Billy and the Lost Boys - I don't own any of their lyrics and apologize for associating them with my uber-nerdiness!


	2. Love in the New Millenium

**Natsukashii  
**_This is the death of summer nights spent on rooftops - d.b.s._

**Disclaimer**: Not my characters - that's what makes it "FAN" fic.**  
**

**------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------**

**Chapter Two  
**

_Love in the New Millenium__  
_

_--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

A dizzy, heady feeling. Sakura breathes in and tastes the freshness of night air. Cool leather under her skin, leaning back. She is in the passenger seat. Sitting with the car window down, not moving, breathing night air. She is outside and inside, edging closer to the end of springtime.

"Here. Drink some more of this."

A cool hand brushes her skin, offering chilled, bottled water. Her face is so warm.

"How are you feeling?"

"I'm sorry..." She falters. Rubs her forehead, still so dizzy.

"It's okay, just drink." The coolness of night air and water is fragrant, such a heady feeling.

Syaoran ruffles his hair, fidgets in place. Nervous, he leans over the steering wheel. "Damn, I don't even know what you think of me right now. Bringing you out here…" Where are they? Sakura holds her head. "You know…" His eyes are lowered, but shifting in anxiety. "It might be selfish to say this right now, but... it's really good to see you." Biting his lip now, looking away out the window. "I mean, really good. I've thought about this…"

Sakura feels her chest swell and tighten, temples pounding. A red flush creeps over her face and she exhales breathlessly... that dizzy heady feeling. Her thoughts and feelings are cross-firing, richoceting around her throbbing head. There is so much to say...

Her lips move tentatively. "Syaoran..."

"God, I've thought about you so much..." He slams a hand down suddenly on the steering wheel and turns to her, with eyes flashing firey. There is a velvet haze moving before Sakura's eyes.

In a moment she is in his arms. He is in her arms. She is tugging at his lip with her teeth, he moves forcefully, struggling together, the stick shift pressing into his thigh. Sakura inhales sharply as he moves his lips on her neck, halting breath, and the smell of him so clean and comforting and long-ago... a velvet haze… she is drowning.

Somewhere, at 3am, a teenaged boy and girl fumble on a cheaply upholstered couch. Their young skin glows blue in the tv set glow, furiously grasping at each other with the overwhelming, unbreathable passion of the new. Furiously grasping, frantically frenetically...

"Stop..." Her hands are under his shirt, nails pressing lightly into a hard, muscular back. He is pulling away from her. "Stop it, Sakura... we shouldn't do this." As he jerks back into his seat, a lightly stubbled jaw scratches past Sakura's cheek. A gasp of sober air, and her eyes begin to focus. Air. She is no longer sixteen, by the light of the tv, holding and holding and pressing against a lanky, excited teenaged body. She is a woman, with a heady-dizzy feeling in her brain, looking into the fierce, passionate eyes of a fully grown man... A grown man in an expensive, new car, with the smell of leather pungent and the seabreeze light through an open window...

He reaches a hand toward her face, gently, eyes softening. "I... I just... care about you so much." Voice strained with emotion, "I think... I just think that..." Welling and welling… the emptiness comes sliding back in like a chill.

"You shouldn't have come back here!" She snaps, batting his hand away and turning, one bare foot placed down on the concrete and now stumbling out of the car. She fumbles with her purse, only one shoe on.

"Sakura!" Hobbling, another shoe on now... the dizziness is overwhelming even in the blast of night coolness, a strong breeze off the nearby water not enough to clear the air of its sickly fragrance - the too-sweet smell of fallen petals, tired petals returning to the ground. _Have to get away have to get away have to get clear..._ have to get clear and run. She is driven by the meaningless, visceral urge to be free of this place, this car, this man. To be away. So she runs.

"Sakura!" Watching her slender back recede, under the tangerine lights and into the darkness, Syaoran exhales and slams a fist into the dashboard. "Sakura..." He swallows roughly. Whispering. "I... I'm still in love with you."

Across the parking lot, down concrete steps, running. Tears stream down her flushed cheeks, running further and further away until her breath is hot and metallic and tiny flecks of blood form in her lungs. Breathing hard, running and running until her feet sink deeply into sand.

She drops, crumbling and doll-like, into the sand with her knees at her chest. Why is it always like this? What is he doing here right now? Why am I always like this? Why… Sakura sniffles and wipes her cheeks with cold palms. Nothing but the sound of the waves. Car horns from far away, why...

_Why keep sleeping when nobody's dreaming_… In her mind there is an echo, and it resonates through her like the ripples of the tide. No more dreams – is this what we have left for us, now that we're older? Now that you're gone? She asks these questions of herself so often that the words become meaningless, and the walls rise and the scars thicken until all feeling is numbed. When we were younger… Sakura digs her toes into cold sand, breathing in deeply. Why did things have to change?

Sex complicates. Bodies are not as simple as impulse promises them to be.

Money complicates. Having it, not having it, earning it. Syaoran's money never mattered to two children's hearts in an endless summer, stretching out tanned limbs on a sun-warmed rooftop. Sakura used to write everything down, channelling rivers of words and song through a pen and paper into those long summer evenings – before money began to weigh on her heart and constrain her river into a stream, then a narrow trickle, and then… nothing?

Now she wars with and against herself, every day behind her walls – going through the motions, heartlessly. She lives each day from 9 to 5, deep inside where nobody else can see. Watching the clock and struggling to keep breathing, she knows this.

Sex, money, choices… so their childish bond stutters, a little, in its transition to adulthood – did they jump the tracks, perhaps? Stuttering, faltering, and making naive mistakes. She remembers the taste of her own tears on the day that he left. Clenched fists, and then… nothing? An ellipsis. She remembers the taste of her tears and thinking is this how things end? Does that have to be everything? He leaves, and up go the walls, the doors, the curtains and the closets. Boarded up for all time.

Does that _really_ have to be everything?

A pencil line of molten gold begins to inch its way across the curvature of the sea as Sakura gazes on. City lights pale across the harbour, and the breeze picks up. This is an early summer sunrise with the scent and taste of spring. She puzzles. Why? There is no reason.

_No reason… _In her bones, Sakura feels young. Breathing a sober, sweet breath, she is conscious of the limber energy and potential in her small body – barely twenty years old. She closes her eyes and digs her hands into the sand, absorbing this sense of power. The sky glows enormously pink gold, and it is a new day.


	3. Forget Everything You Know

**Natsukashii  
**_This is the death of summer nights spent on rooftops - d.b.s._

**Disclaimer**: Not my characters - that's what makes it "FAN" fic.

**A/N:** Excuse the somewhat sappy conclusion - but seriously, what else could I do! haha Thanks to everyone who reviewed my first ever fic, you guys rock.

**------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------**

**Chapter Three  
**

_Forget Everything You Know__  
_

_--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------_

Sakura's pen drops to the page, soundlessly. She pushes away from the desk with both arms and sighs, eyes to the ceiling, full to brimming with a brand new feeling. Or is it a very old feeling? There is no way to be sure, but as she reaches up to remove a rhinestone clip from her unwashed hair, letting the tendrils fall around her face, she is both exhausted and energized, depleted and renewed. Gradually, the room around her is fading into a slow consciousness – the temperature and dimensions, the lines of evening sunlight through the blinds splayed over one wall, the digital face of a clock on the bedside table. Ignored for days, these details now begin to seep into her awareness in a gentle but steady flow. Her stomach growls, and she smiles as if waking from a long sleep.

21 missed calls. Sakura shrugs, unaffected, and scrolls through the list of numbers. Tomoyo, Tomoyo, Work, Chiharu, Tomoyo, Work Work Work Work… Guess I can't go back there, she thinks, relieved in a small way. What time is it? How many days has it been since I looked at the clock, she wonders, glancing at the glowing numbers on the bedside table – friendly now, without the lustre of their menacing significance.

Still dazed from the exertion of writing, Sakura moves toward the sun-striped window and peers through the blinds, down over the golden-lit street. There is a bright yellow sports car parked on the roadside, conspicuous even in the warm light of the evening summer sun. More conspicuous still, a young man with rolled up shirt-sleeves is balancing on the low concrete garden wall, with arms outstretched like a tight-rope walker. He places one foot in front of another cautiously, eyes closed, a picture of contentment on his sun-kissed face.

It feels right, thinks Syaoran, as a small breeze lifts the hair on his forehead – it just feels right, being here. Eyes shut tight, walking along this concrete wall, he feels her presence as a peaceful, soothing warmth. It has been 3 days since the night he saw her again at last, and ever since that night he has been waiting. Back and forth between this spot out front of her house and his client's office, he has not slept. And yet, he feels healthy, relaxed and strong, somehow - he is near to the place that she is. And it almost doesn't feel like waiting anymore, either… Syaoran is simply being. Being here again, at last, it just feels right.

Maybe I'm obsessed with her, he thinks, deliberately teetering on the wall before regaining his balance. If I am now, then I always have been, he decides, with nostalgia. Even as a child, he was forever watching her. Thinking about her. It's been ten years, he remembers, with a muted boyish flush of embarrassment, since his first confession of love to her. And then, the past few years in Hong Kong…

His train of thought is fractured by the sound of an opening door. Syaoran whips his head toward the sound and sees her, standing in the open doorway, with damp hair shining and flushed, dewy cheeks glowing fresh from the bath. Her green eyes catch the evening sun and radiate depth, and clarity, like natural pools in a forest, and Syaoran's knees feel so suddenly weak that he steps down off the wall into the grass.

"H..Hi…"

"Sakura! Uh… hi."

Sakura fidgets with the sleeves of her over-sized sweater. "Um… I really don't know what to say right now." She brushes a strand of wet hair away from her face. "The other night… was dumb, and I'm sorry…"

"No, I'm the one who should be sorry! I shouldn't have… and… and… and what have you been doing all this time?" Syaoran is exasperated, but smiling. It is so comfortable to be near her, at last.

Sakura grins, unexpectedly, her eyes flashing mischief. "I could be asking you the same thing…" A loaded pause… and an exhilarated Sakura begins to run, bare feet slapping along the boards of the patio, jumping lightly onto a deck chair, and turning. "I've… I've been writing!" She grabs hold of the edge of the roof and swings her feet upward, pushing one foot off the patio railing and wriggling her body up onto the low rooftop. Syaoran's eyes widen, and with a few athletic bounds he is on the patio railing in a flash. She is giggling as she tiptoes along the roof tiles.

"Writing? What, a manuscript?" He struggles onto the roof behind her, laughing as well.

"I guess you could say that. Maybe more of a manifesto…" She reaches the crest of the roof and lies back on the tiles, stretching her arms above her head. Syaoran settles down beside her, feeling the warmth of the roof tiles on his back.

She giggles again. "I feel… I feel like myself again, you know?" A cloud moves across her face. "It's been a pretty long time…" Turning to gaze at him, her eyes become inquisitive. She speaks tenderly. "What are you doing here anyway, Syaoran?"

Taken aback, a little, Syaoran looks up at the sky. "I guess that's a good question…" He shrugs. "A friend of the family offered me a junior position in his firm…" Stopping himself, "well, actually I suppose I was looking for it. I wanted… an excuse to come back here, I guess."

A bird soars overhead, without a sound. "I just, well… the last few years have been pretty messed up. I was trying to figure out what I wanted. God, I was such a stupid teenager…"

He shakes his head. "Things were weird when I left here – I just wanted to be somewhere where I belonged, where I could be myself, whatever that means. I wanted to speak my own language, figure out who I really was, you know?"

Sakura nods, slowly. Syaoran lowers his eyes, "All I ended up doing was screwing around for 3 years. Getting in trouble, spending money. I don't fit in in Hong Kong, I speak Cantonese like a foreigner…" Sakura stifles a small laugh. "It's okay, it was pretty dumb... I guess I've been abroad so long that I don't fit in anywhere…"

His eyes are the colour of molten amber in the slow setting sun. He inhales, deeply. "And… I thought about you. I couldn't stop thinking about you the entire time. God damnit I tried… but maybe, you're the only place I really belong after all…"

Looking worried, Syaoran props himself up on one arm, stuttering. "I, I mean, n-n-not to get all weird on you or anything…"

"It's alright." says Sakura, warmly. Gazing up at the sky, she inches her hand closer to him. He blushes at the sensation against his open hand, but smiles, as she entwines her fingers with his. "You know, " she begins, "I've been so afraid of the seasons changing. Thinking that you can never go back – to childhood, to summer nights spent on rooftops… But I was wrong. You can do whatever you want – if you create it yourself. If you're not afraid to, that is... All you have to do is just let go..."

"Then…" Syaoran sighs, wistfulness barely disguising the hopeful tone in his voice. "You think that you and I might be able to start over?"

"Uh-uh, no." Sakura shakes her head sweetly. "But… we can do something even better than that."

"What are you saying, Sakura?"

"I... I'm saying that we can remember everything that we were, and dream everything that we want to become, and live everything that we are in this moment. I'm saying that we can tear down our walls and open our minds to everything, good and bad, we can feel it all… Syaoran..." Her eyes are glistening with tears in the gold of the sunset, but her lips form a gentle smile. "I don't care how I live... how painful it is to remember some things... I just need to be myself again. I need to write and I need to feel, everything." She is looking at the sky. "I know what I want now, Syaoran. No more nothingness, never again. I want... I want everything…"

"Everything..." Syaoran mouths the word, turning it over in his mind. Never in his life has she been this beautiful, and never has he been so sure. "Sakura…" _Right now, here with you, the world makes sense..._ He moves toward her. Purposefully, decisively. "Let's live that way. I want to be with you… through everything…"

And their lips meet, tenderly, like the moist petals of flowers in bloom; like two children's hearts coming home at last. _Just let go_. Quietly, in the slow dying sun Sakura whispers, "It tastes like summer…"


End file.
